March 14, 2016 - Kudos to Campbell Soup

Monday, March 14, 2016 -Undoubtedly motivated by consumer pressure, the Campbell Soup Company has announced that it will work to become the first major food company to adopt food labels that will disclose genetically modified ingredients. This follows the lead of Chipotle, Ben & Jerry’s, Hershey’s and General Mills; all of which have already made moves to limit or eliminate genetically modified ingredients in at least some of their products.

About three-quarters of products made by Campbell (maker of brands like Pepperidge Farm, Prego, Plum Organics and V8, in addition to its namesake soups) contain genetically modified ingredients from corn, canola, soybeans or sugar beets, the 4 most prevalent GMO crops.

Campbell’s will be launching several lines of organic kid’s soups, and removing MSG from all of their kid’s soups. The soups will be non-GMO and certified Organic. Pepperidge Farm will be launching several organic wheat versions of their popular Goldfish Crackers.

In the past Campbell contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight GMO labeling across the nation. A recent interview with Denise Morrison, chief executive of Campbell, revealed a change in the company’s policy. She stated: “We were involved in fighting the state ballots in California and Washington out of concern over a state-by-state patchwork, yet we didn’t participate in the fights in any other state beyond those. Any money we did spend after that was in support of seeking a federal solution. We will withdraw from any coalition that doesn’t support mandatory labeling.”

Calling for uniform, mandatory and nationwide GMO labeling, Morrison said, “We’re optimistic that a federal solution can be reached in a reasonable amount of time, but if that’s not the case, we’re preparing to label all our products across the portfolio.”